Question about recording room tone.

I

ironpony

Carbonite Member
I've been told before that my room tone, is too quiet, to the point where it doesn't even sound like their is room tone, but just nothing on the track. I was told to add more things, like a furnace, or birds chirping out the window, or more wind, etc.

But what if I want a quiet scene on purpose? I want to do a script coming up with scenes that rely on silence to create suspense, like No Country for Old Men. Those scenes require almost total silence, so how do I make that sound natural, since the room tone cannot be heard.

Unless I am recording it wrong, and perhaps I need to record it really loud to sound natural? My collaborators tell me to add white noise but I feel that will just bring down the quality, otherwise, why would people use such good pre-amps in the first place, if white noise had to be added later?
 
Most of the room tone I use comes from my library and as for adding white noise??? (WTF) or any other effects that should only be done in audio dubbing and not on location.

If I do record room tone on location it is generally done at the same level as the dialogue so it can be used for filler in any edits of the piece.

As for recording new room or ambiences to be added in post I tend to record these as and when an interesting location or sound crops up but if it is not that busy I just leave it and add an appropriate stereo background from my library to enhance the location or create a feel that the project requires!

I have even slowed random music tracks down so slow that they create a nice weird moving ambience for sci-fi films.
 
I thought I was suppose to record at the same level as dialogue but apparently it's not loud enough, in my experiences so far. I was also told on here before that library room tone will not work, and that you have to get the tone from the room, which is why it's done that way. Unless that's not so, of course?
 
Who is telling you this? is it the dubbing mixer or re-recording guy as he/she should know better!

I have thousands of room and ambience tones and most of the location recorded ones tend to be useless as there is always noises that you do not require.
 
I think we're getting room tone and ambient sound beds greatly confused here.

Room tome is the natural noise floor of the set or location. It is the sound that is constantly present behind the dialog. Always record :30-:60 of room tone at the end of a scene, using the same mics as the dialog and with all the same equipment running. Do not turn the recording levels up for this; simply call for room tone after the last take and ask that all cast and crew lock themselves down and stay perfectly still for the short duration required to record. In post, this is used to smooth out dialog edits. If the location is unusually quiet, it may not be as big of a deal, but better to have it and not need it.

Ambient sound beds are textures added in post, after the dialog edit, to create the desired sound image. This could be the sound of traffic outside of a high-rise, wind and birds in the forest, walla in a restaurants, etc. Even if you go back to the location later with a hand-held recorder to grab some stereo "room tone" recordings, you're really getting ambient sounds. While some ambient beds may be referred to as "room tones," for the purposes of this thread the two terms need to be clearly separated. Also, ambient beds recorded in the shoot location will be of no use to you in editing dialog.
 
Again Mr. pony you are listening to (I was going to say something rude), folks who are less than informed. Or your tolling for fun. I am not sure anymore which.

But for others anyway, room tone is the "silence" on the set. What the, umm "editor" is asking for is ambience and backgrounds which would not be recorded on set. Though they may be recorded close if the set is in a specific location. But if my sound editor said something like that to me (and I was director, producer, or picture editor) I would look very strongly at replacing them with someone who had a clue.
 
ironpony said:
I've been told before that my room tone, is too quiet, to the point where it doesn't even sound like their is room tone, but just nothing on the track. I was told to add more things, like a furnace, or birds chirping out the window, or more wind, etc.

But what if I want a quiet scene on purpose? I want to do a script coming up with scenes that rely on silence to create suspense, like No Country for Old Men. Those scenes require almost total silence, so how do I make that sound natural, since the room tone cannot be heard.
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Once again we have a set of questions that already have the answer in the opening post.

If you want total silence, then put total silence in. If you like what they did in that movie, then copy that. You want total silence and you want it to sound natural? Which do you want? You decide.
 
"I think we're getting room tone and ambient sound beds greatly confused here"
+11
Don't they teach this sh_t in film school?
(or is that not covered like 'what a producer should expect to pay a pro sound mixer')
<end rant>
 
Rick R said:
"I think we're getting room tone and ambient sound beds greatly confused here"
+11
Don't they teach this sh_t in film school?
(or is that not covered like 'what a producer should expect to pay a pro sound mixer')
<end rant>
Click to expand...

While I tend to think of Ironypony as some what of a foil... Some of the readership has not had the benefit of 'film school'... And even taking classes at a college that has a 'film department' may not yield classes in actual 'filmmaking'... I didn't attend UCSD as a 'film student'... but the Wife did a double major and I took notes for her... so, in that sense I did attend classes in 'filmmaking' there... however, like her Art Department classes, most were theoretical, and pondered such questions as 'is art, art, and if art is not art, what is art?'... The practical 'filmmaking' classes were at the time mostly video, using U-matics and 3/4 inch tape for editing. I don't recall the 'audio' lab being used, nor classes requiring such... As it was the Wife never really took to 'moving pictures'... but stayed with Stills... in that regard she did go to a 'prestigious' New York school for art earlier, and pretty much did not advance in any way with the UCSD program... but even there, it was more on the topic of 'what is art'... rather than hard core technical processes involved in image formation via camera and film.

To this day, I'm the 'technical' one because even the crappy no name colleges I attended had more technical 'photo' processing classes than the fancier universities we've attended. (UCSD, SDSU).

Even the college I ended up in to get my degree in math, which had a more established 'Film and TV' program, it was mostly 'TV'(which is why I had zero interest in getting into the program..), and perhaps a few classes in 'audio', but again rather limited.

This of course was 'years ago', when the equipment Film, TV, Audio was very expensive, and so one could justify that schools with limited budgets had only limited offerings.

But these days, when a 'lap top' can process either digital film or audio 'better' for some value of 'better', (for example, editing audio, no wiping the reels back and forth to find the 'cut' point, then splice and dice, to edit... done no with a few key strokes...), I see no reason why programs can be improved... but alas... attended several local junior college production classes... and while they did have editors, cameras, etc... they were still almost on a par with 'back in the olden days', just upgraded enough for the modern world.

-------
As for finding local people who will work for 'free' on projects... in my area of competence, that is camera work... there are many who claim to be 'excellent', but when it comes down to it, they have no idea of 'camera work' other than a few 'tricks'. I don't think I've run across more than one or two 'audio' people who were even remotely competent.

You get what you pay for... of course... but that said, what I don't see is an 'enthusiasm' for learning the stuff... in the afore mentioned production classes, the students were rather lackluster, and needed to be prodded to make the requisite film projects...
 
I don't know if there is a decent sound for film curriculum anyplace. I'm sure there is one somewhere but I have never heard of it. I taught sound for film, but there was so little time allowed and emphasis on sound that other than the very few who were really into sound I'm not sure if much sunk in.

It seems to make hardly a dent when you explain what goes into a major film sound track, and half of them your making it sound "complicated" so you can keep working.

Of course the flip side is it's not rocket science. It's a lot like acting. If you work hard almost anyone can be a decent actor. Talent steps you up to a different level and you can be really good, but most of the working actors are decent, with moments of brightness. Sound, post anyway though I suspect it's just as true for production, is 90% about doing the work and 10% about brilliance.

I think the problem for a lot of students is that the above is probably true for directing also but they get the glory, while the sound teams hopes to beat the honey-truck driver in the credits. If you don't love the job you don't want to do the work and then you are constantly looking for the "easy way"... and your "work" sucks.


In IP's example he (and probably a fair number of people) think there was silence in scenes form "No Country for Old Men". He thinks that because he has never learned to listen. I didn't work on it but I know the folks who did and I would be completely shocked if the track count ever went below 50, probably closer to 100. Not every track will have something playing al the time but I would bet money that there was never less than 16-20 active tracks at any point. They didn't have any dialog for something like the first 20 min. of the film but there was a LOT of sound.

BTW if you ever "hear" room tone somebody screwed up. You will certainly never "hear" it in a big budget feature. It used smooth dialog edits ,not to add to the soundscape.
 
Noiz2 said:
...

In IP's example he (and probably a fair number of people) think there was silence in scenes form "No Country for Old Men". He thinks that because he has never learned to listen. ....
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Interesting assumption on gender.
 
It just shows a little knowledge goes a very, very long way. I'm not even convinced that room tone is a sensible descriptor. Older people in the UK would talk about presence, but I prefer ambience myself. The notion of wanting to record with enough of it to make it a feature is plain daft (UK speak for nearly stupid). I like the term ambient because it describes the way the room reacts to stimulation by something. Wind, rain, people, background noise like pipework, or electrical equipment. A space with NO sound in it does not have a tone (or timbre). It is silent. Silence of course is rare, so there are clues in what we hear from any sound source in the room - even really quiet ones.

If we are producing a product that is going to be convincing in terms of realism, then it has to look and sound right. It's only recently that we can buy software to remove reverberation - up to two or three years ago, we stated with absolute certainty that reverberation could not be removed, and took great pains to make sure we recorded as dead as possible.

If I recorded material in an acoustically dead room, I'd be able to treat it to sound like almost any location. Ironpony, sadly has idiots who give him advice. I don't mean necessarily that these people are actually stupid, but they are providing advice based on concepts ironpony hasn't yet mastered, and I suspect strongly that they are diluting the accuracy to attempt to get the basics across. This is common in education when very difficult concepts and practices need to be taught. The teacher actually distorts the truth a little to make it more palatable, then they hopefully return to it once it's sunk in, and put right their mis-information. Some educationalists state this process is a bad one, and accuracy should not be compromised in this way - but my experience says that it does work. However, you have to accept that some people will accept the information at face value, draw conclusions from it and then promote it as fact. This I think is what happens to iron pony.


Good sound is often simply the absence of bad sound, so the ratio between wanted and unwanted sound is the important thing here. To much effort on reactive processes to put right badly recorded sound, and too little effort on recording good sound in the first place.
I was told to add more things, like a furnace, or birds chirping out the window, or more wind, etc.[\quote]
This is simply 100% wrong. You add these things as atmosphere afterwards, once you have the dialogue sorted, to add back realism. Have you ever tried to join birdsong? You have to overlap and crossfade, and still the joins are evident. It takes a lot of time and effort. A constant sound like burners in a furnace might edit a bit better, but hard butt joints just don't work - and just make editing mechanical. You often can't cut where you need to, you have to compromise.

Ironpny needs to evaluate everything he does, and stop these people giving advice. It is often so wrong that I wonder if somebody is taking pleasure in seeing hom flounder around taking in real rubbish as fact, and then making himself look foolish on the forum by telling us and making us sigh, or worse, laugh!

I have friends who spend considerable time recording wild tracks on location, and for them to work well, the real audio needs nothing at all in the background. If ironpony's audio is like this, he's there!
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Well take this scene from No Country for Old Men:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBqbMZ23n5o

In the background, their seems to be a faint sound of the sound you hear coming through the window, but their is also a slight hissing in the background. A lot of movies have this slight hissing. And that's where I think maybe I've been told I can't make a scene sound natural is because their is no hissing and it's just too quiet, even with room tone, in between the dialogue and sound effects tracks.
 
ironpony said:
Well take this scene from No Country for Old Men:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBqbMZ23n5o

In the background, their seems to be a faint sound of the sound you hear coming through the window, but their is also a slight hissing in the background. A lot of movies have this slight hissing. And that's where I think maybe I've been told I can't make a scene sound natural is because their is no hissing and it's just too quiet, even with room tone, in between the dialogue and sound effects tracks.
Click to expand...

There are so many layers of sound design going on in that scene that it is far from silence... but the "hissing" you're talking about is really hard to judge from an Internet upload that could have gone through who-knows-what-kind-and-how-many levels of compression and processing. 20-30 years ago, that may have been self-noise from open reel tape used to record production dialog. Heck, it may be self-noise from the mics and mixer, but considering there's no dialog in this scene I would doubt it... most of this is probably Foley and FX.

But if I understand you correctly, you're letting somebody convince you that your sound isn't "natural" because it doesn't have a crummy artifact in it? Look, you are consistently getting bad advice from your locals. A full sound design is nothing "natural" when it comes down to the final product you hear in movies. It's layers and layers of carefully-chosen and intentionally-placed sounds. You start with the dialog edit, which is smoothed out using room tone to bridge edits. Then, you layer in your background sounds that include the constant ambient track (or layers of them), plus your other background sounds that you want to complete the image (cars passing, dogs barking, sirens, alarms, etc.).

But, if you must, go ahead and capture some hiss from an old cassette and layer it into your movie. It'll send your sound mix down the crapper, but at least it'll sound "natural" at last.
 
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"... I think maybe I've been told..." Have you or haven't you been told? And what do you care what others think? It's your show; do what you want. Do you like the sound? Then add it. If you don't like the sound, don't add it.

It doesn't matter what the big films do or what your associates think or what this forum thinks.

Post a clip from your scene and the forum can provide input.
 
I just wanted to say, that unlike many folks in many threads, I love ironpony. Ironpony is extremely advanced, and you are showing your ignorance by attacking him - he's the most advanced AI I've yet come across, and I'm privileged to live in times of such amazing technology. Right now, he's gathering knowledge and is coming closer and closer to passing the Turing Test - in fact, it seems that for most, he has already passed, and only the most discerning can spot the tell-tale signs of silicon chips flexing under pressure.
 
That's why I've twice asked to see clips. Is there anything behind all of this?

I find this an interesting psychological study. How humans respond to certain stimuli on a forum.
 
Paul F said:
Interesting assumption on gender.
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Not really, if you have seen many of "his" posts, but aside from that "he" is also the neuter term in english as much as there is one so no real assumption is being made. Though I would be quite surprised if IP is female.
 
ironpony said:
Well take this scene from No Country for Old Men:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBqbMZ23n5o

In the background, their seems to be a faint sound of the sound you hear coming through the window, but their is also a slight hissing in the background. A lot of movies have this slight hissing. And that's where I think maybe I've been told I can't make a scene sound natural is because their is no hissing and it's just too quiet, even with room tone, in between the dialogue and sound effects tracks.
Click to expand...

There is no dialog in that scene so there isn't going to be any "room tone", at least by american usage of the term.

Room Tone is the sound that production records when it's "silent". It sounds like the set with no dialog.

Ambience is background sounds that are general in nature and don't have specific identifying sounds in them. As such they would be the closest to actual "room tone".

Backgrounds basically ambiences that have specific identifying elements.

So an ambience would be the "air" in a place, it doesn't tell you day or night or where exactly, a room, maybe a large room.

The background adds things like birds, or circuits, or city traffic. It tells you something specific about the location.

These are american usages and I'm sure they change in other countries. Actually that is really Northern California usage, but It's also Hollywood usage.

The scene from NCfOM, as I assumed is loaded with sound. There is no production sound in there. It's remotely posible that some PFX made it in but I doubt it. That is 10 or so tracks of Foley and I'm guessing 20-60 tracks of FX. It depends on how you count and and how pieced together some of the sounds are. Stereo is counted as two tracks so backgrounds build the track count fast.

Tracks will start to sound "natural" when there are too many little things going on for the brain to keep track of. Anything that doesn't change the brain stops paying attention to and won't "hear" anymore.

As to "slight hissing" you may want to get a hearing test. I'm actually not kidding. It may be you just don't have a better description on your tung but you may also have some tinnitus, and you should start dealing with that ASAP.
 
I did a well known UK cop show called The Bill for five years which was a straight up acting TV show like Hill St Blues etc, I once had some coke head director come into the dub and ask me to make it sound like "Alien".

I told him to F***K Off :happy:

When doing audio dubbing you can pretty much put whatever you wish on the soundtrack but if it doesn't compliment or match the visuals you might as well run a loop of white noise on everything or even better 35/16mm sprocket noise like they do with silent films!
 
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